Ever stayed up all night
reading a book? In this workshop, you’ll learn
you how to build that kind of tension. And we'll help you put into
practice the techniques professionals use – on every page and in every kind of
story – to create drama and tension.

Workshop leader Brian Henry has
been a book editor and creative writing instructor for more than 25 years. He
publishes Quick Brown Fox, Canada’s
most popular blog for writers, teaches creative writing at Ryerson University
and has led workshops everywhere from Boston to Buffalo and from Sarnia to
Charlottetown. But his proudest boast is that he has helped many of his students get their first
book published and launch their careers as authors.

Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Note: Don't ever miss a post on Quick Brown Fox. Fill in your email in the box to the right under my bio, and get each post delivered to your In Box. So it’s
Christmas break and you’ve had time to finish your novel, polish your query
letter, and with New Year’s upon us, you’re full of resolution to land
yourself an agent this year. Wonderful. But hold up. Right now is the worst
time of the year to query an agent.

You want to avoid
querying an agent when:

-She’s
not in the office

-She
is in the office but not working

-She’s
trying to get work out of the way before going on holiday

-She’s
crazy busy

So forget
sending queries from about mid-December to mid-January. Starting about two
weeks before Christmas, the publishing world begins shutting down. Yes, agents
are still in the office, but they’re trying to clear their desks before the
holidays start. The last thing they want is to look at queries.

As
Christmas gets closer, less and less work gets done, and agents are disinclined
to pitch your manuscript anyway, because they know that editors at publishing
houses are doing just as little work; they’re more likely to be sipping eggnog
than looking at new manuscripts.

Then from
Christmas to New Year’s, odds are no one’s even in the office, but come January
2 (or the first Monday after New Year’s), agents are back in the office
and discovering that the work hasn’t gone away. They have 567 emails cluttering
their In Boxes, a pile of manuscripts they should really have read a couple
weeks ago, and in general so much work that they (almost) regret taking time
off.

Do they
want to read queries now? Hardly. Give them a week or two to get things under
control again.

But this
is a great time of year to plan your campaign, to comb through the postings about agents on Quick Brown Fox (here), to make your lists of possible
agents and preferred agents, and to write targeted queries. Also, if you haven’t
done it yet, trash your generic query and make a New Year’s resolution to write
only personalized queries from now on. Because once the holidays are out of the
way, this is a pretty good time of year to query agents. Certainly better than
the fall, which tends to be crazy busy in the publishing world.

But what
if you already have sent out a flurry of queries this holiday season?

Well, Don’t worry, be happy,
as Saint Bob used to say. A few agents will have used the dead time in the publishing world to catch up on things – like reading queries. Some agents are extra dutiful and will get to your query eventually even if you sent it in December 22. As for the rest, give it a reasonable amount of time and re-query all
agents who haven’t sent you a reject. At least, that’s what I’d do. – Brian

Olga Filina

Note: I’ll
be leading a "How to Get Published" workshop in Niagara on the Lake on Saturday, March 7, with literary agent Olga Filina of
The Rights Factory (see here)
– and Olga is actively looking for new authors.

Also, I’ll
lead a“Writing
for Children & for Young Adults" workshop
with Anne Shone, Senior Editor at Scholastic Canada, on Saturday, May 2, in
Oakville (seehere).

Weekly
courses: Whether you're looking for an introduction to creative
writing or you're getting your manuscript ready to submit to an agent, your
best bet is a weekly course. Starting in the new year, I’ll be offering classes
for beginners through advanced writers. See details for all six courses here.

For
details of “Welcome to Creative Writing” on Tuesday afternoons
in Burlington see here,
for “Writing Your Life & Other Personal Stories” on
Tuesday mornings in Oakville see here,
for “The Next Step in Creative Writing” on
Wednesday evenings in Burlington see here,
on Thursday afternoons in Mississauga see here, and
on Thursday evenings in Georgetown see here, and
for “Intensive Creative Writing” on Wednesday
afternoons in Burlington here.

Sunday, December 28, 2014

Whether you’re a beginner or advanced
writer, if you’re looking for places to send your work, you should put contests
on your list. The Canadian Writers’ Contest
Calendar is a book that gives a full
listing of contests in Canada arranged by deadline date. It lists contests for
short stories, poetry, children’s writing, novels, and nonfiction – contests
for just about everyone.

The Calendar costs just $21 at one of Brian Henry's classes or workshops $25.10 by mail within Ontario (all taxes and shipping included).

This workshop will show you how
writers plot a novel and will give you the best tips
on writing short stories. We’ll also look at where to get your stories
published and how to win contests. Best yet, you’ll see how to apply the
story-building techniques you’ve learned to your own writing.

Workshop leader Brian Henry has been a book editor and
creative writing instructor for more than 25 years. He publishes Quick Brown Fox, Canada’s
most popular blog for writers, teaches creative writing at Ryerson University
and has led workshops everywhere from Boston to Buffalo and from Sarnia to
Charlottetown. But his proudest boast is that he has helped many of his
students get their first book published and launch their careers as authors.

Friday, December 26, 2014

The Field by Tracy Richardson, winner of the 2014 Eric Hoffer Award in the YA category

Each year, outstanding works of short prose deserve wider recognition.
TheEric Hoffer Awardsfor short prose ($250) and for independent books ($2,000) recognize
excellence in writing. It’s free to enter a piece for the short prose award;
books require a $55 fee. Books must be
from a small press, an academic press or be self-published.

Works of short prose (short stories or short creative nonfiction) must
be less than 10,000 words, previously unpublished, or published with a
circulation of less than 500. The winning prose and selected nominations are
published annually in the anthology, Best New Writing.

Deadline: Jan 21 for books; March 31 for prose. Full submission guidelineshere.

Hi, Brian.I am
editing an anthology of Polish diaspora centred short stories, which will be
published by Guernica Editions. The information is below.
Thanks,Kasia Jaronczyk

Guernica Editions is looking for stories, previously unpublished
in a book form, for an anthology centered around Poland and Polish Diaspora.
Open to Canadian writers of Polish origin and Canadian writers whose work
connects with Poland or Polish diaspora in some way. Stories are to be no
longer than 2,500 – 3,000 words. Royalties are in the form of two copies of the
anthology. Check out our website here. Please send electronic submissions
as a word doc file to poloniaanthology@gmail.com

Deadline: Jan 31, 2015.

Hi, Brian.

I really appreciate you
sharing links to my stories with your readers (here and here). We have announced our
new book label (Tipsy Squirrel Press) and we’re looking for submissions for our
upcoming anthology: Martinis
and Motherhood – Tales of Wonder, Woe, and WTF?!

The general vibe is one of sisterhood and
humour. Stories should be 800 – 1,200 words and will be paired with a martini
recipe and a toast. You can submit your own martini and toast, but don’t have
to.

In Fact Books (US) seeks
stories that address the trials of living with mental illness for an upcoming
anthology, tentatively titled: Beyond Crazy: True Stories of Surviving Mental
Illness. Stories should combine a strong narrative with an informative or
reflective element, reaching beyond a strictly personal experience for some
universal or deeper meaning.

Thursday, December 25, 2014

Wednesday, December 24, 2014

She
is at the bottom of the City Hall steps looking up, way up, looking in awe at the
human Christmas tree. I am certain it is Suzanne. My heart starts beating
faster, and I will her to climb the steps.

The human Christmas tree is created
by a mass of people, more than two hundred, dressed in suits of forest green.
Everyone is wearing white tuques and white mittens to add the visual effect of
snow having settled upon the greenery.

There must be twenty branches of this
tree that spreads wide and climbs up the twenty-three steps that lead towards
the entrance of City Hall. The tree sits on a base of two dozen people and grows
ever so slightly narrower as it ascends towards the final and twenty-third
step. The man on the top step,
at the very tip of the human tree, is dressed in shiny gold. His arms and legs
are spread out at forty-five degree angles. He is the star of wonder whose
royal beauty bright graces the whole project and whose presence hopefully
guides passersby to come from afar bearing a variety of tithes for charity.

I am at the end of the ninth branch
of this human Christmas tree. Although I have been feeling depressingly blue, I
am dressed in glittering red. I am the ornament hanging at the extremity of the
ninth branch.

I watch Suzanne and I am in awe of
her radiant beauty. Time has been kind to her in the decades since I last her
saw at our youth club’s year end dance. And oh what a night that was.

I will never think more of myself
than I did on that dance night so long ago. I branded every young lady but two
with a florescent smiley face sticker on the back of their dress. While dancing
with a young lady, I’d slowly slip my hand down to rest upon the soft curve of her
buttocks. There I had gently applied a sticker.

That was one glorious night for me; I
fed my ego for hours. I was eighteen years old, displaying as much maturity as
a six month old Golden Retriever. I felt that I alone owned that dance floor.

As the music once again slowed, I
placed my hand into my left pocket and looked towards Judy. Lovely Judy. She
was chatting with a few girl friends as I made my move in her direction. She was
to have been my next conquest. But beyond Judy’s shoulder, I saw her ex-boyfriend
Nicholas who seemed to be in a debate with his own conscience. His body leaned towards
Judy as he tried to work up the gumption to ask her to dance, but his feet
seemed to be stuck in neutral.

I hesitated in my approach towards
Judy, for I imagined that at that late hour and that late in the season, her Nicholas’
chance was then or never.

As Nicholas finally got his act in
motion and moved towards Judy, I chose to concede to his desires and backed off.
Ha, I guess I did have a heart back then, and it was gutsy of him to try and regain
the lover who had cast him away earlier in the summer. I watched as Judy smiled
and accepted his offer, and as they began to dance, I started to sing the words
to that song: “Whenever you reach for me. I’ll do all that I can.” I sensed the
power of love reigniting between them.

A forceful tapping on my shoulder interrupted
my tune.

I turned to stare into the chest of the
six foot-five inch brother of the only other young lady in the room who I had
not tagged with a smiley face that night. The big bruiser jerked his thumb over
his shoulder indicating that I should ask his sister Suzanne to dance. Now. I
knew it was in my best interest to do just that.

I walked across the dance hall to
where the sister and her flowery dress blended into the wallpaper on the far
wall. Suzanne’s eyes lit up when I asked her to dance. I took her hand and led
her out to the centre of the floor. As I put my right arm around her waist, my left
hand reached into my pocket. I fingered my roll of stickers and but before I
could make my move and stick a claim on her, Suzanne sighed and blurted out
that she loved me.

She told me that she had loved me
since time began. She told me that my asking her to dance was the most
wonderful event of her life. It was the last dance of the night and, as I
understand now, most people have expectations when courted on the last waltz.

But you just don’t tell a man you
love him right off the bat like that. At least you don’t tell me that. I released
the roll of smiley-face stickers in my pocket. This lady would not become my next
conquest. Not if there was love involved.

With
the first notes of the last dance, a black light had come on, and the smiley
faces stuck on the back sides of all the ladies in the hall, except two, began
to glow in testament to my ego. I had held each one of those ladies in my embrace
that night. One at a time, just me and them. I’d quietly celebrated each new
claim. I was a numbskulled narcissist, a total knob. But I didn’t know it
then.

I had also had this obsession of not
being able to stop myself from singing along whenever there was music playing.
It was instinctive. I knew all the words to the songs, especially the old moody
slow dances. And I could sing, in
fact I still can today. I had sung through all my earlier dances and even while
dancing with this love sick Suzanne, who I desperately wanted to turn off, I
couldn’t shut my mouth.

Suzanne
misinterpreted my actions. She assumed that since I was singing a love song, I
was singing specifically to her, that she was being serenaded. Suzanne didn’t
understand that when there was music I just had to sing and couldn’t be muted no
matter how hard I tried to squeeze shut the vocal chords.

“I am so in love with you,” Suzanne once
again cooed in my ear.

I
was unable to reciprocate that emotion in the slightest, but I kept on singing
even though I knew the collateral damage it was causing.

While
most ladies left that social evening with a smile glowing upon their backs, Suzanne
left with a glowing in her heart. That glow glimmered for some time but would never
generated a reciprocal response from me. She waited for a phone call that never
came and hoped for a knocking upon her door that never occurred.

Life went on.

And now I see Suzanne climbing the
steps at city hall. She stops to gaze at our human tree of wonder. She listens
to our music. We of the human Christmas tree are actually a choir – a poor one
I admit – comprised of downtrodden folk of the city. Standing on the ninth
branch, I’m as downtrodden and defeated as most. But I can sing better than any
of them.

I am the tenor on the ninth branch.

The human Christmas tree is a
project of the city’s Mayor who brings together the homeless and at-risk folk
and offers us a paying job: to sing Christmas carols between noon and one p.m.
every weekday throughout December. We also sing from five to seven on Wednesday
through Saturday nights.

Battery operated red lights flicker
on and off at the top of our white tuques, adding some glitter to our
night-time performances. On Christmas Eve we will compete with the downtown
churches, trying to draw away their midnight worshippers. I am out of work, out
of luck, and pretty well out of chances to get back on my proverbial feet, but
this Christmas time gig makes me feel almost like a regular guy again.

I watch Suzanne closely. She slowly
climbs a few steps, pausing at each branch while absorbing the music. She is
getting nearer to my branch. I sing as powerfully as I can. My voice is the one
thing I have left. I don’t need to focus on the sheet music. I know these
carols by heart and I focus all my energy upon performing just for Suzanne.

We are not a good choir by any
stretch of imagination but the Mayor’s “On Your Feet Again” program is making a
difference by using a normally useless contingent of his inner city folk. His
is banking on the assumption that even a bunch of crappy singers can’t butcher
a Christmas carol too badly, and in any case, at this time of year, the Mayor figures
the populace will cut us some slack.

The Mayor organizes a group of
volunteers to feed us free meals as we linger between shows. He lets us hang
out at the nearby convention centre, where he has a group of retired business
people trying to teach us computer skills and effective job search techniques.
This hasn’t done me much good, but I guess you never know.

I notice Suzanne’s lips moving and I
realize that she is singing along with us. We in the choir have reached out and
touched another bystander. I strain my ears and swear I can hear her sweet voice
weaving through the din of our choir. The spirit of Christmas that exudes from our
tree of human retreads is powerful.

The choir stops as we catch our
breath before moving on to the next carol in our repertoire and Suzanne has
moved up another step. She is standing by the ninth branch. My knees feel weak.
Suzanne and I have not been this close since the night of the club dance when
she expressed her love to me.

I look at Suzanne standing right
there just a few feet to my side. She is scanning the faces on the ninth
branch. We begin singing about Good King Wenceslas and the Feast of Stephen. I push
and project the power of my tenor voice to its limits. I may never have sung
with such passion. I may never have been in such need of acceptance.

Her eyes move towards me, the red
ornament, and a smile spreads across her face. She joins in as we hit the
stanza where “a poor man comes in sight gathering winter fu-u-el.” I can tell Suzanne
does not recognize me. The twenty-some years that have passed have not been kind
to me.

I am sixty-five pounds heavier than
I was when I held her in my arms the night of the club dance. My cheek jowls
hang down the sides of my face like saddlebags from a mule. My long greasy hair
hangs out the back of my toque in a ponytail. My collapsed nostril is a
scarring from my close encounter with cocaine.

I must get Suzanne to realize that
it is me. As her eyes once again settle upon me and my distinct voice, I sing
my lines directly to her. “Thou shalt find the winter's rage, Freeze thy blood
less coldly.” It is as if I am on one knee, begging her to let me, this poor
man, back into the warmth of her heart. Her eyes remain fixed on me and they seem
to bore deeply into my soul. I reciprocate her gaze.

She moves up the steps to the tenth
branch of the human Christmas tree. I turn my head and watch as she goes but I
am still singing directly to her. Then she moves to the eleventh branch. I
rotate my torso and continue my serenade. On to the twelve branch and I know I
have lost her. No surprise there. Why would she ever want the sad sack of bones
that I’ve become?

Our carol ends and my heart collapses.
I turn back and face the City Hall Square at the foot of our Christmas tree.

We begin our next song. It is the lovely
“O Holy Night,” a carol in which my range of voice excels over all the other
choir members. It is my time to shine but my spirit has darkened. The song
begins and I can only lip-synch the words. My shoulders have slumped. My chin
dips and disappears into my meaty jowls.

And then Suzanne is beside me again.
She is so close. I feel sweat surfacing on my forehead.

She is staring into my eyes. My
voice regenerates and I join the choir in their lyrics. Her eyes are locked on
mine, as I have again fixed my gaze upon her. Her head nods as if there now just
might be some slight recognition. A smile spreads across her face but it is a
sad one. She reaches her hand towards me and her bare fingers linger for
several seconds as they make contact with my white mittens. I feel her warmth
seep through the woollen fabric.

Suzanne turns away without a word
and continues ascending the human Christmas tree. She is gone. She has stuck a
crisp twenty dollar bill to my mitten.

Glen Benison has had nonfiction articles published in two
Canadian running magazines and in the Ottawa
Citizen; he has had seven of his (very) short stories broadcast on CBC
Radio. Six years ago, he turned his fancy to fiction when he discovered many ideas taking
seed in his mind and then escaping onto his keyboard. He is never certain
how a story might unfold and once his fingers start the qwerty dance, a story’s
ending is often totally out of his control.

This is your chance to take up
writing in a warm, supportive
environment. This course will open the doorto all kinds of
creative writing. We’ll visit short story writing and children’s writing,
writing in first person and in third person, and writing just for fun.

You’ll get a shot of inspiration every week and an
assignment to keep you going till the next class. Best of all, this class will
provide a zero-pressure, totally safe setting, where your words will grow and
flower.

Note: Read two reviews of the "Welcome to
Creative Writing" course here. More reviews here.

If you've
ever considered writing your personal stories, this course is for you.
We’ll look at memoirs, travel writing, personal essays, family history
~ personal stories of all kinds. Plus, of course, we’ll work on creativity and
writing technique and have fun doing it. Whether you want to write a book or
just get your thoughts down on paper, this weekly course will get you going.
We'll reveal the tricks and conventions of telling true stories, and we’ll show
you how to use the techniques of the novel to recount actual events. Weekly writing exercises
and friendly feedback from the instructor will help you move forward on this
writing adventure. Whether you want to write for your family and friends or for
a wider public, don't miss this course.Note: Read reviews of Brian's
courses here.

St. Alban's Church, 537 Main
Street, Georgetown,Ontario (In
the village of Glen Williams. Map here.)

This course will challenge you
to take a step up in your writing. The format will be similar to the
"Intensive" courses, but with less reading between classes each week,
leaving you with more writing time. Over the ten weeks of classes, you’ll be
asked to bring in four pieces of your writing for detailed feedback. All your
pieces may be from the same work, such as a novel in progress, or they may be
stand alone pieces. You bring whatever you want to work on.

Besides critiquing pieces, the instructor will give
short lectures addressing the needs of the group, and in addition to learning
how to critique your own work and receiving constructive suggestions about your
writing, you’ll discover that the greatest benefits come from seeing how your
classmates approach and critique a piece of writing and how they write and
re-write.

Note:Check out two reviews of the Next Step coursehere. More reviews here.

Intensive Creative Writing isn't for beginners; it's for people who have
been writing for a while or who have done a course or two before and are
working on their own projects. Over the ten classes, you’ll be asked to bring
in five pieces of your writing for detailed feedback. All your pieces may be
from the same work, such as a novel in progress, or they may be stand alone
pieces. You bring whatever you want to work on.

Besides critiquing pieces, the instructor will give
short lectures addressing the needs of the group, and in addition to learning
how to critique your own work and receiving constructive suggestions about your
writing, you’ll discover that the greatest benefits come from seeing how your
classmates approach and critique a piece of writing and how they write and
re-write. This is a challenging course, but extremely rewarding.Note: Check out a review of the Intensive course here. More reviews here.

Brian Henry has been a book editor, writer, and creative writing instructor for more than 25 years. He teaches creative writing at Ryerson University. He also leads weekly creative writing courses in Burlington, Mississauga, Oakville and Georgetown and conducts Saturday workshops throughout Ontario. His proudest boast is that he has helped many of his students get published.